The huge problems currently being experienced in the Cape
Town/Cape Peninsula property market are exacerbated to an alarming degree
right now on the Cape West Coast, says Paul Henry, the MD of Rawson Developers
and Construction.

The difficulties here, he said, arise from the fact that a significant
percentage of the homeowners on the West Coast live elsewhere and buy
here for holiday or retirement purposes  these are, therefore, their
second homes.

In the difficult economic scenario now being experienced, said Henry,
holiday home buying has almost come to a standstill and many of those
who did buy here in boom times are now defaulting on their bond commitments.

The situation appears to be especially serious from Yzerfontein
northwards to Veldrift, said Henry. Owners of second homes
who used to be able to subsidise their monthly bond payments through short
term rentals are finding that there are very few takers these days 
the weekend away is often the first thing to be cut on an austere budget.
For this same reason hotels and B & Bs are well down on turnover.

Houses, said Henry, are now flooding onto the for sale market
and some very attractive buys are now possible. Rawson Properties has
franchises at Yzerfontein, Langebaan and Saldanha.

The lucky sellers are those able to accept a substantially lower
offer. The less fortunate sellers are those who still owe the banks far
more than they can now recoup on a sale. In the worst cases, the owners
have lost not only their holiday homes but also their primary residences
because those were put up as security. The four major banks have collectively
repossessed large amounts of West Coast properties since the start of
this year.

Developers too, said Henry, have experienced hard times this year.

Often they have completed the initial infrastructure such as boundary
walls and guard gates, a show house and the services for one or more phases
only to find that buyers are not materialising. We ourselves at Rawsons
have plans to expand to this area on account of its long term potential
but we have now shelved those for a year or so.

Among the most severely affected developers, added Henry, have been those
who planned to go ahead with retail centres or had completed them only
to find now that they cannot hold onto tenants.

One project likely to buck the trend, added Henry, is Shelley Point.
Here Dale Capital, the new owners of the hotel, country club, spa, golf
pro shop and conference facilities have sufficient capital to continue
developing through the recession in anticipation of the inevitable upswing
in mid-2010. House prices, too, said Henry, have held up well here 
at an average level very close to R2 million  the reason probably
being that the upper middle and upper income buyers in this estate have
often sufficient resources to ride out the recession.

In the circumstances, said Henry, SAs banks ought to be as lenient
and patient as possible  but, driven as always by the need to try
and increase profits and drive up share prices, it seems unlikely that
they will show much sympathy or understanding for the difficulties of
this area which was beginning to emerge from poverty but which it seems
will have to wait a while longer.